Delegatable Pseudorandom Functions and Applications

We put forth the problem of delegating the evaluation of a pseudorandom function (PRF) to an untrusted proxy. A delegatable PRF, or DPRF for short, is a new primitive that enables a proxy to evaluate a PRF on a strict subset of its domain using a trapdoor derived from the DPRF secret-key. PRF delegation is policy-based: the trapdoor is constructed with respect to a certain policy that determines the subset of input values which the proxy is allowed to compute. Interesting DPRFs should achieve low-bandwidth delegation: Enabling the proxy to compute the PRF values that conform to the policy should be more efficient than simply providing the proxy with the sequence of all such values precomputed. The main challenge in constructing DPRFs is in maintaining the pseudorandomness of unknown values in the face of an attacker that adaptively controls proxy servers. A DPRF may be optionally equipped with an additional property we call policy privacy, where any two delegation predicates remain indistinguishable in the view of a DPRF-querying proxy: achieving this raises new design challenges as policy privacy and efficiency are seemingly conflicting goals. For the important class of policies described as (1-dimensional) ranges, we devise two DPRF constructions and rigorously prove their security. Built upon the well-known tree-based GGM PRF family [15], our constructions are generic and feature only logarithmic delegation size in the number of values conforming to the policy predicate. At only a constant-factor efficiency reduction, we show that our second construction is also policy private. As we finally describe, their new security and efficiency properties render our delegated PRF schemes particularly useful in numerous security applications, including RFID, symmetric searchable encryption, and broadcast encryption.

Providing Anonymity in Wireless Sensor Networks

Abstract—Sensor networks are often used to monitor sensitive information from the environment or track sensitive objects’ movements. Anonymity has become an important problem in sensor networks, and has been widely researched in wireless ad hoc and wired networks. The limited capacity and resources of current sensor networks have brought new challenges to anonymity research. In this paper, two efficient methods are proposed based on using a one-way hash chain to dynamically change the identity of sensor nodes in order to provide anonymity, and their anonymity properties are analyzed and compared. I

Defending Against the Unknown Enemy: Applying FL I PIT to System Security

Abstract. Most cryptographic systems carry the basic assumption that entities are able to preserve the secrecy of their keys. With attacks today showing ever increasing sophistication, however, this tenet is eroding. “Advanced Persistent Threats ” (APTs), for instance, leverage zero-day exploits and extensive system knowledge to achieve full compromise of cryptographic keys and other secrets. Such compromise is often silent, with defenders failing to detect the loss of private keys critical to protection of their systems. The growing virulence of today’s threats clearly calls for new models of defenders ’ goals and abilities. In this paper, we explore applications of FL I PIT, a novel game-theoretic model of system defense introduced in [14]. In FL I PIT, an attacker periodically gains complete control of a system, with the unique feature that system compromises are stealthy, i.e., not immediately detected by the system owner, called the defender. We distill out several lessons from our study of FL I PIT and demonstrate their application to several real-world problems, including password reset policies, key rotation, VM refresh and cloud auditing.

Health-status outcomes with invasive or conservative care in coronary disease

BACKGROUND In the ISCHEMIA trial, an invasive strategy with angiographic assessment and revascularization did not reduce clinical events among patients with stable ischemic heart disease and moderate or severe ischemia. A secondary objective of the trial was to assess angina-related health status among these patients. METHODS We assessed angina-related symptoms, function, and quality of life with the Seattle Angina Questionnaire (SAQ) at randomization, at months 1.5, 3, and 6, and every 6 months thereafter in participants who had been randomly assigned to an invasive treatment strategy (2295 participants) or a conservative strategy (2322). Mixed-effects cumulative probability models within a Bayesian framework were used to estimate differences between the treatment groups. The primary outcome of this health-status analysis was the SAQ summary score (scores range from 0 to 100, with higher scores indicating better health status). All analyses were performed in the overall population and according to baseline angina frequency. RESULTS At baseline, 35% of patients reported having no angina in the previous month. SAQ summary scores increased in both treatment groups, with increases at 3, 12, and 36 months that were 4.1 points (95% credible interval, 3.2 to 5.0), 4.2 points (95% credible interval, 3.3 to 5.1), and 2.9 points (95% credible interval, 2.2 to 3.7) higher with the invasive strategy than with the conservative strategy. Differences were larger among participants who had more frequent angina at baseline (8.5 vs. 0.1 points at 3 months and 5.3 vs. 1.2 points at 36 months among participants with daily or weekly angina as compared with no angina). CONCLUSIONS In the overall trial population with moderate or severe ischemia, which included 35% of participants without angina at baseline, patients randomly assigned to the invasive strategy had greater improvement in angina-related health status than those assigned to the conservative strategy. The modest mean differences favoring the invasive strategy in the overall group reflected minimal differences among asymptomatic patients and larger differences among patients who had had angina at baseline

Initial invasive or conservative strategy for stable coronary disease

BACKGROUND Among patients with stable coronary disease and moderate or severe ischemia, whether clinical outcomes are better in those who receive an invasive intervention plus medical therapy than in those who receive medical therapy alone is uncertain. METHODS We randomly assigned 5179 patients with moderate or severe ischemia to an initial invasive strategy (angiography and revascularization when feasible) and medical therapy or to an initial conservative strategy of medical therapy alone and angiography if medical therapy failed. The primary outcome was a composite of death from cardiovascular causes, myocardial infarction, or hospitalization for unstable angina, heart failure, or resuscitated cardiac arrest. A key secondary outcome was death from cardiovascular causes or myocardial infarction. RESULTS Over a median of 3.2 years, 318 primary outcome events occurred in the invasive-strategy group and 352 occurred in the conservative-strategy group. At 6 months, the cumulative event rate was 5.3% in the invasive-strategy group and 3.4% in the conservative-strategy group (difference, 1.9 percentage points; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.8 to 3.0); at 5 years, the cumulative event rate was 16.4% and 18.2%, respectively (difference, 121.8 percentage points; 95% CI, 124.7 to 1.0). Results were similar with respect to the key secondary outcome. The incidence of the primary outcome was sensitive to the definition of myocardial infarction; a secondary analysis yielded more procedural myocardial infarctions of uncertain clinical importance. There were 145 deaths in the invasive-strategy group and 144 deaths in the conservative-strategy group (hazard ratio, 1.05; 95% CI, 0.83 to 1.32). CONCLUSIONS Among patients with stable coronary disease and moderate or severe ischemia, we did not find evidence that an initial invasive strategy, as compared with an initial conservative strategy, reduced the risk of ischemic cardiovascular events or death from any cause over a median of 3.2 years. The trial findings were sensitive to the definition of myocardial infarction that was used